Business & Tech

Diversity Fuels Lake Zurich's Business Climate

Chamber of Commerce director says business mix has helped village fare better than others during tough times.

A "diverse" business environment is helping Lake Zurich's business climate stay healthy and fare much better than many other communities across the country. The current vacancy rate of just less than 10 percent is far better than the national average, said Dale Perrin, executive director of the Lake Zurich Area Chamber of Commerce.

 A "fair amount of diversity" between retail and industrial business is what has helped Lake Zurich fare well during the recession, Perrin said.

There is a lot of commercial activity going on in Lake Zurich, according to Bob Vitas, village administrator.

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"There are a lot of new businesses starting up, there are a lot of businesses expanding, a lot of businesses remodeling," Vitas said at last week's Town Meeting on the sales tax referendum. "More than in the past two years."

"Our vacancy rate is less than the Chicago metro area and the national vacancy rate," he added. At the same time, seeing some vacancies and turnover is normal.

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Meanwhile, no meaningful recovery in the national commercial real estate market is expected until 2011, according to The National Association of Realtors.  Nationally, average office vacancies are at 17.6 percent,  industrial vacancies are at 14.6 percent, and retail vacancies are at 12.7 percent.

While there have been several large visible vacant locations along Rand Road, such as the K-mart building, Big Apple Bagels and the Omega Restaurant, more businesses have opened than closed at about a 60-40 split, Perrin said.

In the same area as the empty K-mart building, the Holiday Inn Express, Sonic Drive- In and Starbuck's have opened.

Additionally, Sports Clips,  Spa Soma and Designor Consignor all opened within the past month. Beelow's Steakhouse is set to open at the end of October. And Walmart is expanding into a superstore

An established infrastructure of roads, water and sewer also make Lake Zurich an attractive place for businesses to locate, Perrin said.

"For the most part, the infrastructure into what a business needs is already there," he said.

Although in the early stages, the Lake Zurich Area Chamber of Commerce is working to establish an economic development department.

The communities of Lake Zurich, Deer Park and Hawthon Woods are looking at developing their own economic development departments, and the chamber wants work with them, Perrin said.

The overall approach to attracting businesses to the area is to take have a regional philosophy, Perrin said.

Regardless of which community a major manufacturer locates in, it would benefit the entire area by creating hundreds of jobs for the local educated and available workforce, he said. Additionally, the area would benefit from the employees of such a company spending their earnings at local businesses.

"In my opinion, I think there is plenty of space available in any one of those categories [retail, business or industrial] for anyone who wants to come in," Perrin said.

 


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